AstroProdigy

Yeah that's why I wish I had said it here months ago, but haven't been posting here in a while. I just want someone like Aileron, ThunderJam, or Confess to come on and disagree with me so I can bring this back up in their faces later on when it actually happens.

Too bad.

Well when he talked about talking to Iran in order to bring stability to Iraq he was similarly pounced on. Face it when a politician talks about what's actually wrong and what actually is needed to be done Americans are outraged. It's not even politicians refusing to tell the truth anymore. It's people in America not wanting to here the truth from politicians, but instead being content with the sugar coated lies they've been getting. I blame the teachers union for not letting the education system be fixed so people will stop getting dumber, but then again that's only one of many factors. I still think McCain will end up screwing himself over even after all of Hillary's help. Iraq is starting to unravel and I think it's faster than Bush's cronies predicted it would. At the same time the mess we're getting deeper and deeper in is proving to be almost entirely caused by the deregulation that conservatives (and unfortunately some Democrats like Bill Clinton) created in the past and McCain is refusing to change his tune no matter how bad things look for fear of not looking conservative enough to prevent conservatives from defecting. Aileron: Don't bull!@#$%^&* me that New York City saps all the money from New York State. New York State is run by corrupt up-staters who recently stopped Bloomberg from getting federal funding for a congestion pricing plan because it would upset people not from New York City who use cars to get into Manhattan. They pretended it's to protect the boroughs from unfair pricing as well as non New York City areas, but everyone here knows only the richest people from the boroughs can afford to drive their cars into Manhattan and put them in expensive private parking while the vast majority take the subway who's prices will shoot up because of Albany doing the opposite of giving kickbacks to New York City. New York City gets back 11 billion dollars less in state taxes than it gives that go right into funding rural districts and other cities upstate that wouldn't be sustainable as useless and corrupt as they are without New York City paying for it. If anything it's the rural areas of upstate that are getting kickbacks at the expense at the wealthier New York City and the surrounding counties that keep unproductive upstate afloat. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the same in Pennsylvania, but you can't get past your longtime conservatism long enough to see it because cities there are filled with liberals, black people, and gays and that's not peachy with you. Rural areas and suburbs only survive by siphoning money away from the more productive cities in the form of taxes and considering the size of Philadelphia I'm sure the same is done in Pennsylvania. Okay I know you have some weird hatred for the Clintons, but if you ever decide to go buy a dictionary look up the worlds liberal and then authoritarian because they are antonyms and using oxymorons may make sense when you talk about freezer burn or deafening silence, but in this case it just makes your irrational hatred for the Clintons look silly.

Now I wish I posted here about how stupid the notion of the troop surge working was months ago when I saw what was really happening, but I guess nows good enough. One Part of the Lie That's Now Unfolding Maliki, our militia leader of choice in Iraq, didn't have the foresight nor the military know how required to realize a militia equipped with fancy American weapons couldn't do anything if it didn't want to fight an enemy composed of its own brothers whereas that enemy has plenty of morale fighting what it sees as an American puppet regime. The ceasefire Sadr ordered months back, which is what was actually responsible for the decline in violence along with the Awakening Councils, only made it seem as though Bush could win the war. I guess that suits Bush because it's given him at least a year to delay any action on troop withdrawals without actually accomplishing anything in the long run. It turns out all the time that Sadr's been holding off on fighting the occupiers he's been building legitimacy among large segments of the Iraqi Shiite population using Hezbollah inspired humanitarian tactics. On the surface, for the short term at least, it seemed as though Sadr was doing this out of fear of the troop surge and it was an American victory, but anyone who bothers to look past what mainstream news tells them could see he was merely biding his time and building legitimacy until America or Iraqis on America's side screwed up. That came with the Basra offensive in which overconfident Maliki thought he could defeat an insurgency using brute force when even America's much better trained military couldn't do. The result is Maliki humiliated in the eyes of Iraqi Shiites as a weak military leader and Sadr looking strong. Sadr ended the fight before the Americans could join in with their massive air power and real military where his militia could actually take serious damage. He did what an insurgency leader should do in asymmetric warfare while at the same time looking like the good guy among Shiites for stopping the fighting even though he was trouncing Maliki's militia, the Iraqi Amy, to spare bloodshed. The "defining moment" that Bush talked about, which is impossible in an insurgency because that doesn't involve major battles, was actually a humiliation for American supported Maliki while at the same time strengthening both Sadr in the eyes of Iraqi Shiites as well as Iran, which ended up mediating the ceasefire afterwards and gained prestige as the neutral party which America from day one refused to be.

Aileron your wrong on Iran being a sponsor of insurgents. In fact Iran has it's hand in just about every faction of Iraq (except for Al Qaeda). Maliki and his Dawa party was exiled to Iran and Syria until they returned to Iraq after the fall of Saddam. The Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council that's part of the government is also supported by Iran. In fact Iran and the US are both betting on Maliki because Sadr is an actual Iraqi nationalist and rejects Iranian influence. His relationship with Iran is merely due to convenience since the US so stupidly made sure there was no chance there could be a productive relationship between them. See Iran bet on all the horses whereas we bet on the fat, stupid ones that have no idea how to run military operations, as evidenced by the utter humiliation Maliki suffered in Basra. Britain would have never made such idiotic mistakes in their empire....sigh. Also, Bush pretends Iran only supports our "enemies" because that creates an us versus them at!@#$%^&*ude whereas the truth doesn't make the war drums beat.

If Obama wasn't black it never would have mattered what his preacher said. White evangelical preachers say stuff that makes Obama's old preacher look like Mother Theresa, but no one seems to care when McCain goes out and actively courts their favor. Heck when McCain embraced a pastor who calls Catholicism a cult of devil worshipers there's no conceivable response that could be as big and overblown as the one to Obama. To Aileron and Confess: Have you ever actually listened to Obama's speaches? He is a great speaker! The fact that you ignore the impact that has had on where he's gotten is just you trying to push "affirmative action" to discredit a Democrat. If he was a Republican, oh say Condoleezza Rice, running for president you wouldn't be saying she only got where she was because she's black. Sounds like thinly veiled partisanship to me.

While I agree you can't blame the sub-prime mortgage crisis on him you can blame the weak response on him and his party as well as the Democrats for being so weak as to compromise as an ineffective plan that only puts us further in the hole. The fact is Republicans are trapped here because their party ideology forces them to cut taxes or give tax rebates to solve the problem, but that's ineffective since instead of focusing on the problem they are simply giving everyone money that people not in trouble don't need and whereas people in trouble need much more. Also, Bush set about creating a richer upper class rather than help all Americans. Tax cuts did little to help the people in trouble when it came to the .com bubble bursting. All those tax cuts did was make the rich richer while ignoring everyone else and letting them slide down the economic ladder. On top of this Bush piled on debt so now we have a much more limited ability to respond to crises without going bankrupt. If by "we" you mean credit card companies and banks sure, but blaming the public as an excuse for poor government policy that will only exacerbate the situation is misleading. The public can mess up, but that's exactly why we have a government in the first place. Once that government fails even with such a bloated budget with such high taxes then the government is the #1 culprit to blame.

Sorry for the delayed response. NBVegita: Sounds like you're safe, but your situation is completely different from that of the vast majority of Americans. Millions of people are at risk of (and at the rate things are going probably will be) foreclosing on their homes and even the prime mortgage industry is taking a hit. Not only that, but anything you can think of that people have debt on is going to bite them in the !@#$%^&*. Give everyone 600 dollars? Sounds re!@#$%^&*ed. Bush refuses to "waste taxpayer money" helping the people who need it most, but has no problem putting the US further into debt for a face saving and an almost entirely ineffectual stimulus package that the people who need the money will just end up using to pay a tiny percentage of their debt. I can't just blame Bush here, though. It seems there's no one in power who has any idea how economics works or if there are they either keep their mouths shut to play politics or are drowned out by the stupidity. Also, notice while the GDP of the US has grown consistently during Bush's presidency the median income has fallen $1000. That on top of high inflation and all the problems that are just beginning to play out that affect even people who are upper middle class means that only the richest have had anything to gain from Bush while everyone else has taken a big hit.

That's a pretty biased source, candygirl. Especially since it says Cuba has biological weapons and helps terrorists. Sounds like fear mongering to me. It also !@#$%^&*umes what America offers Cuba is freedom. We sure brought freedom to Iraq after all. Looks like women are doing real well with the rights now.

Huckabee can't get the nomination even if he wins the entire south. Mccain already has half the votes he needs and the super delegates would give Mccain the win even if Huckabee makes a very dramatic comeback. It just goes to show how messed up our primary systems are. Aileron you clearly have a very warped view of Hillary Clinton. For all her faults you seem to have taken things to a crazy extreme. If Hillary lost the nomination there's absolutely no chance whatsoever she'd run as an independent. If she were to purposely cause a Republican to win any popularity she has will be long gone. Speaking of fixing elections who's the one who stole Florida in 2000? Yeah thought so.

What do you do for a living?

Looming- To seem imminent; impend. This is what isn't the definition of looming: Looming- To already be here.

You both seem to be ignoring the actual problem here. The credit crunch isn't going to end with a token $200 billion gesture. The military budget and war supplemental price tags are getting bigger and bigger. On top of that we can't use common sense to realize that heavy spending requires a raise in taxes. It's not going to be solved by cutting social services as that is an agenda that is being pushed in the name of a balanced budget. The debt continues to mount and while China is our number one debt buyer they see the falling dollar as a liability to their profits. One stroke of the policy pen and China bankrupts the "all powerful" United States. The housing crisis isn't the problem in itself. If it wasn't that it would eventually be something else. That major weakness is somewhere along the way America has turned into a heavily overfed consumerist country that has no notion of sustainability. The stability has only been kept by our dominance and that is only going to be challenged more and more with the rise of other countries and ins!@#$%^&*utions, but especially China and the EU. What Republicans and Democrats have both so gladly compromised on is a reinforcement of the over consumerism. People seem convinced that all problems in the US can be solved by consuming more. Here's a newsflash. Skewed production/consumption ratios are the ruin of countries! Going further into debt for the sake of more consumption solves absolutely nothing and only furthers the underlying weakness in the US economy. You don't fix the housing crisis by giving everyone 600-1200 dollars. Sever: In the last 50 years we went from a lender country to a debtor country. It was fairly stable all the while because of decent economic policies, but first Reagan and now Bush Jr pushed that debt with their "economic know-how". I think the Democrats are very much to blame for letting Republicans regain the mantle of "fiscal conservatism" despite the fact that they have been the opposite of that throughout the Bush presidency and continue today.

GET CYCLING IN THE ECONOMY?! Clearly you have no idea what you're talking about and are willing to throw around some terms you heard on one of the corporate owned media conglomerates, which you don't seem to even have the capacity to do so correctly.

Well if we aren't in one now we will be soon. In what world does borrowing 200 billion dollars from China to give people enough money to buy more products from China sound like a solution to an AMERICAN recession? Who is our government working for anyway? This is a bipartisan criticism as both sides chose to play politics rather than actually try to solve the problem. Seems like the extreme right and the extreme left are both trying to push their agenda and the compromise is something that once again only makes things worse, but does so closer to the "center".

Silly girl if asians could fly then Kim Jong Il would have someone to carry his nukes.

Aileron: The problem with your arguments as they always are is you’ve warped all the definitions and rules that apply here. Almost everything you say in your argument is a fallacy. You claim “terrorists” should be treated like soldiers even if they are in civilian clothing yet international law is very specific about the treatment of terrorists, which we don’t follow. You’ve also purposely misstated the golden rule by changing the word to change the definition to what is actually the opposite of its intended purpose. The golden rule states to treat others as you would have them treat you. You either purposely or subconsciously replaced “have” which means “like to” with “expect” which would justify letting the Jews go on to genocide against Germans in response for the Holocaust. You also seem to have mixed up your definitions for “soldier” and “machine”. A soldier is still a human being and under international law has rights. If you would like to not follow international law then the United States no longer has a claim to being a civilized nation. The fact that the US still denies the immoral torture policies and people buy into it and make excuses for it as you do for example follows your other definition of:

I think black culture is wrong and evil. However I am not a racist I just think everything involved in being black is wrong. Anyone buying this? Give me a break when someone has a racist opinion they have to keep it to themselves, but when someone has a homophobic opinion it's legitimate and should be considered in law? If you want to think homosexuality is wrong that's entirely your right, but when groups of you nut bags go vote on limiting gay rights because of your bigotry and it's considered legitimate that's the real messed up !@#$%^&* here. I have no hatred for Christians. I just hate the Christians who have and continue to use their religion as an excuse for being bigots such as the modern ones today who use Christianity as an excuse to hate gays. You don't just believe what you believe! YOU TRY TO MAKE IT INTO LAW!! If I was a piece of !@#$%^&* looking to reverse the progressive advances of our society and go back to the good old days (where if you were gay it was legal to hang you by the way) then I invite all Christians to come up to me and call me a piece of !@#$%^&*.

Don't forget they didn't have me and JDS playing this round so that makes up for losing Dav. If all 3 of us were playing then the Gods would still lose just not as much. The fact is that the Gods are completely utterly dependent on Dav so if he's gone there's absolutely nothing they can do to win.

Being a New Yorker I can tell you Giuliani is the most worthless piece of pond s!@#$%^&* alive. As much as I hate Bush I hate Giuliani more. His beliefs are the ones that get him elected. To get in power in New York he acted like a social liberal, but now he acts like he is a Christian even though he never goes to church. He's not a Christian it's just fashionable in America to act like one. He uses 9/11 as a political tool constantly even though he only made things worse with poor planning. He was probably too busy with the photo ops to protect the rescue workers from the toxic fumes. Even his kids hate him. He is the fakest candidate around and I guarantee he'd be even more of a neo con than Bush. I think we can agree there is a certain amount of sincerity in Bush's beliefs, but Giuliani's are all fake and it's all about the power with him.

25Women are an object to love and give yourself up for. 28Love your wife as you do an object you're strongly attached to. A healthy wife is a healthy body and they are both objects. 29Why would you hate other things you OWN. You should take care of your PROPERTY just as god rules over the church. Those are only two of many verses in the bible telling men that women are not in fact equal to men, but instead objects to be taken care of. Even the BEST verses concerning women in the bible are sexist. That doesn't even include a swath of other verses you have conveniently ignored such as the one telling women to cover their heads when preying because they are inferior to men and not worthy to pray directly to God as men can that I mentioned earlier in this topic. Seriously if you are going to try to defend the bible as not a sexist do!@#$%^&*ent you're better off just walking around aimlessly because then at least you get some exercise getting nowhere.

So when Merry X-mas is used instead of Christmas to cater to the PC crowd you need to either stop getting angry about it or admit to the hypocrisy. After all press, and chain stores are private enterprises, they aren't affiliated with the government, and should be able to air whatever they want. I admit that PC people take things too far, but so do Christians in this regard so there's blame to go around.